Dr Esmond Birnie (34) is firmly on the pro-agreement side of the Ulster Unionists. He is a close associate of Mr Dermot Nesbitt and Mr Reg Empey, key advisers to Mr David Trimble and two of the party's best-known moderates.
Dr Birnie is a former economist and lecturer at Queen's University, Belfast. He was elected to the Assembly last year. He is a former member of the British Conservative Party in Northern Ireland.
He joined the Ulster Unionists shortly after Mr Trimble became leader in 1995. He is the party spokesman on the British-Irish Council, set up under the Belfast Agreement. Dr Birnie was born in Scotland but grew up in Ballymena, Co Antrim. He now lives in Belfast. He has a first-class honours degree from Cambridge. He is a committed Christian. His interests are 18th-century art and railways.